that I’d committed to just hours ago to stand up to him, to demand he get off my land and pay for what he’d done.
This moment had been what was in store for me all along.
Some things we just can’t outrun.
He hit me so hard my head bounced against the edge of the stove.
And the world went dark.
For Adam. For everything.
Acknowledgments
My life is rich with friends who inspire and help me. My gratitude is endless.
To Maureen McGowan, Ripley Vaughn, and Stephanie Doyle: you are the foundation of so many great things in my life. Thank you.
To Bonnie Staring, Shari Slade, and Carolyn Crane: thank you for your comments and support—your input made the books so much better. I’m really honored to have you in my corner.
To the Toronto Romance Writers, the Western New York Romance Writers, and the Ottawa Romance Writers: your workshops and the resulting lightbulb moments I had made these books possible.
Simone St. James, between the beers and the writer’s retreats¸ we’ve got a good thing going.
Pam Hopkins, my agent—an amazing compass constantly pointing me in the right direction.
Shauna Summers, Gina Wachtel, Sarah Murphy, and the rest of the amazing team at Bantam: your hard work and faith in these books has been humbling and inspiring.
And to my readers: I am just so blessed. Thank you.
BY M. O’KEEFE
Everything I Left Unsaid
WRITTEN AS MOLLY O’KEEFE
THE BOYS OF BISHOP NOVELS
Wild Child
Never Been Kissed
Between the Sheets
Indecent Proposal
CROOKED CREEK NOVELS
Can’t Buy Me Love
Can’t Hurry Love
Crazy Thing Called Love
About the Author
M. O’KEEFE can remember the exact moment her love of romance began; in seventh grade, when Mrs. Nelson handed her a worn paperback copy of The Thorn Birds. It wasn’t long before she was filling up notebooks with her own story ideas, featuring girls with glasses and talking cats. Writing as Molly O’Keefe, she has won two RITA awards and three RT Reviewers Choice Awards. She lives in Toronto, Canada, with her husband, two kids, and the largest heap of dirty laundry in North America. When she’s not writing, she’s imagining what she would say if she ever got stuck in an elevator with Bruce Springsteen.
molly-okeefe.com
Facebook.com/MollyOkeefeBooks
@MollyOKwrites
Annie and Dylan’s darkly emotional, wildly intense romance continues in the breathtaking sequel
Coming soon from Bantam Books
Continue reading for a sneak peek
ANNIE
Annie McKay came to slowly. Aware in pieces of her surroundings.
The pebbled linoleum of the trailer floor dug into her cheek. Her ankle was twisted, wedged against something hard.
The hot copper smell of blood made her stomach roil and she gagged.
“Annie, I’m sorry.”
That voice…oh God.
It was Hoyt. Her husband. Standing over her.
For heartbeats, lots of them, she wasn’t sure he was real. Perhaps she’d tripped and fallen, hit her head coming back into her trailer. She was hallucinating. Pulling Hoyt out of old nightmares. That made much more sense.
Because there was no way he could have found her here.
I was careful. I was so careful.
Two months ago, she’d run from him. Taking only the bruises around her neck and three thousand dollars from his safe. Desperate and scared, she left in the middle of the night and made her way in circles to this place. A patch of swamp called the Flowered Manor Trailer Park and Camp Ground in North Carolina.
Miles from Hoyt. From Oklahoma. From the farm where she’d lived her entire life.
And she’d been happy. The happiest she’d ever been. Not even two hours ago, she’d left Dylan and his magical house. Her body had been flush and alive and pleasured. And her mind had been clear.
She’d had plans, real plans, for her life, not just panicked and terrified reactions.
Everything had been about to get better.
“Annie?”
This is not a hallucination.
Be smart, Annie. Think!
“You hear what I said to you?”
She lay there silent. Hoyt hated her silence. Apologies were to be met with immediate acquiescence. His guilt immediately assuaged.
But she said nothing. Because fuck him.
“Get up.”
She kept her eyes closed, because she wasn’t ready to actually see him. Not here. Not in this trailer. Her home.
Hoping to feel her phone still in her back pocket, she rolled onto her back.
Please, please, she prayed, please be there.
But there was nothing under her butt. The phone was gone.
“There you go. It ain’t so bad, is it? Get yourself up off the floor.” He said it like she’d fallen, like she’d landed on the floor through her own clumsy, stupid means.
Despite her best efforts, hot tears seeped under her lashes.
“Come on now.” His hands touched her hip and her armpit to help her up and she flinched away; her